by Moe Zilla

Created on: March 01, 2010

"Captain Abdul's Little Treasure" is a silly book about pirates - and it's got a lot of gimmicks. The book comes with a CD of the story being read by Andrew Sachs, the 76-year-old character actor best known for playing Manuel on Fawlty Towers. Author Colin McNaughton improvies a lot of pirate jokes on his way to a satirical plot. When the pirates open their first treasure chest, left behind by the captain's wife, they discover it contains a baby who needs a baby-sitter!

"Abdul, I'm fed up with doing all the work around here while you're out playing with your crew. So me and the other pirate wives have hired a ship and gone off for a week's pirating. Look after my little treasure whiel I'm away... Signed, Doris."

It's a busy book with a lot of text, but McNaughton tries hard to bring his pirate crew to life. He includes extra pirate-y details - it's a summer morning on a port on the south coast of England as they prepare to stalk a Spanish galleon - but McNaughton also mixes in an equal number of jokes. (The name of their ship is "The Golden Behind," and one of its crewmembers is "Poop Deck Percy Ploppe.") McNaughton even writes the first word on every page with giant black treasure-map letters.  ("Kaboom! Argh! Treasure? Avast...!") And when Captain Abdul bellows at his crew, his dialogue appears in dark bold letters.

"Who be a-disturbin' o' me beauty sleep firin' cannons? I'll 'ave 'im strung up by 'is ears from the yardarm, that I will. Ooh-arrgh, by the powers! Oh, me poor leg..."

Abdul growls that they should toss the baby overboard, but his crew points out that's against pirate rule #53.  (You can only throw a baby overboard if it's got a tail and smells fishy - because then it's either a fish or a mermaid.) One fiesty pirate drools at the thought of eating fish and chips made from mermaid, but then the pirates get down to the task of housekeeping. They divide the crew into baby-sitting teams - and soon they're dealing with all the trouble that a baby pirate can cause!

The book's target audience is obvious: it's for children who like pirates. (Or is it for parents who like pirates, and want to share that with their kids?) Or maybe it's just for people who want a funny picture book, since there's lots of cartoony drawings.

Including one of the hapless pirates tied in a massive tangle of knots by the tricky baby!

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